Johann Fortner

Johann Fortner (25 November 1884-26 February 1947) was a Lieutenant-General of the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany.

Biography
Johann Fortner was born in Zweibrucken in the Kingdom of Bavaria, German Empire (present-day Germany) on 25 November 1884. In 1903 he joined the Bavarian Army and served in World War I on the Western Front, captured at the Battle of Flers-Courcelette in 1916. Fortner was held as a POW for the rest of the war, and in 1919 he joined the Bavarian State Police after leaving the Reichswehr. In 1941 he became commander of the German 718th Infantry Division and was promoted to Major-General. Fortner was stationed in occupied Sarajevo in Yugoslavia (present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina), and he attempted to burn the Sarajevo Haggadah Jewish scripts. However, the Muslim librarian of the museum smuggled it to an imam and said that he had already given it in to another German officer, saving his Semitic brothers. He executed Jews and Romani in Serbia, but in March 1943 he was added to the reserves and he retired in March 1944. After the war, he was tried for war crimes and hung on 26 February 1947 in Belgrade.